


A Boy Who Fed Himself to the Fish

by Zess1827



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: College AU, Fantasy, M/M, Mystery, Probably horror, Twisted Kuroko
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-23
Updated: 2015-08-23
Packaged: 2018-04-16 19:25:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4637382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zess1827/pseuds/Zess1827
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In a mini-park in the middle of the university where Kagami attends lies a very clear lake. Here, he met a mysterious boy named Kuroko, who asked him one day why the lake was dirty when it looks very clear to his eyes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Notes: This is an AU and fantasy story, where everyone in the Kuroko no Basuke is in college. The idea of the whole story sparked when I read the Saiyaku wa Boku o Suki Sugiru (a shounen-ai manga), so the atmosphere might come out the same, maybe.

**_Kagami POV_ **

It was as if the chirping of birds, the flow of water, and the sound of leaves brushing the wind became mute all of a sudden –

– _Hello, good afternoon –_

And he greeted me, a stranger, who sat beside him in the corner of the lake in the middle of the campus.

– _Are you also going to feed the fishes?_ –

I unconsciously nodded, but did not do anything.

There were no fishes to feed anyway.

I just sat there, curious.

Curious why his voice seemed distant, yet just decibels away.

Curious why I was attracted to go to watch this lake when I had never been interested in environment-related things.

I did not notice the long silence, not an awkward one, but peaceful.

He kept silent for a while. From time to time, he would throw a fish food as if the lake was an aquarium. Then, when a little tadpole unexpectedly jumped out of water, he smiled at the little splash it was making in the still water.

A ripple was formed – it spread out and out, until the circular patterns disappeared in the water

And the lake was tranquil again.

– _It’s already time. Goodbye._ –

He bid farewell, a little sway of hand as gesture.

Then, there was the sound of nature again – this time cicadas were singing.

It was loud.

I never noticed it until that blue-haired boy left the lake.


	2. "Kuro-kai"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a little knowledge on how Japanese write things aside from Hiragana and Katakana. I don't know if Kurokai can actually be written with the kanjis for black and dragon or black and church. Please forgive me in this aspect. For those who knows, please do tell me, for future references. Thank you.

**_3 rd person POV_ **

“Furi! Let me borrow your Calculus notebook!” Kagami shouted to his brown-haired friend as he entered the classroom for the subject. Furihata Kouki was always the one taking down notes religiously, even though the professor was explaining it poorly.

Furihata turned his face to his friend, before getting his bag to fish out the notebook and giving it to the other boy. “This only covers the part we’re going to have for the second exam.”

“Yeah! Thanks, man!” the redhead Kagami put the notebook in his own bag. And then he remembered another thing form his Japanese literature class. “Hey, Furi, did you take Japanese lit. under Prof. Riko?”

“Nope, that’s just an elective. No way, I heard that she’s a terror!” the brunet said as his face twitched with the mention of the name. “But I heard Hyuuga-senpai took that subject, and received an A! How’s that!”

“Really?! I guess I’ll ask later after the practice!”

The Calculus professor then arrived. Everyone became silent, and Kagami took his seat.

* * *

 

Calculus was a very harsh subject, with all the x’s and y’s and sigmas and epsilons, and Kagami thought he could never fathom why he needed it for his course. He had asked Furihata several times, but the boy did not know as well.

The class just ended minutes ago, and he exited the Mathematics building to go to cafeteria for lunch.

The usual path from Math building to any other building in the northern portion of his campus included a walk across that park with the lake in the middle. And today, he was passing by as well.

Despite the narrow concrete road, and more of the grassy or muddy ground, every student had walked into the park, and had known the existence of the lake with the clearest water. You could actually know who’s new to the campus or to the pathway when they looked fascinated at the pristine lake, or when they take pictures of it. Other students, like him who had watched the unchanging lake for almost 3 years now, just looked at it with indifference.

Today, he stepped into the uneven pavement once again. Step by step, slowly, as he appreciated the silence of the tree-laden park, that contrasted the nonstop lecture from all his classes today.

He reached the middle portion of the pathway, and from there, he was facing the lake.

The body of water, a little 3 meters away from the concrete road, surrounded by slippery, moldy boulders, shone as the rays of sun hit its surface.

As if a magic, then, he saw once again the blue-haired boy he met yesterday.

And as if he was hypnotized, he removed himself from the concrete road, and walked to the mushy ground, not caring that his Nike basketball shoes got dirty.

– _We meet again, mister_ –

Kagami wondered why his voice, despite sounding monotone, registered to his brain as magical, angelic, and just very soft as if he was listening to a lullaby.

The blue-haired boy, clad in white shirts and khaki jeans, sat in one of the boulder that had no molds. His shoulder bag was on the top of his lap, and his legs were hanging to the side of the rock facing the water.

“Ah, hi…” he replied, though sheepish. He kept standing near the bluehead, not knowing what to do.

Kagami heard chuckles and conversation, coming from the students walking through the concrete road. No one seemed to notice them though. No one was looking as well, as if they were invisible. Or were those just his imagination?

– _I’m Kuroko Tetsuya._ –

The boy said, looking at him with the eyes having similar color as the hair.

“Kagami Taiga.”

– _Can I ask you something, Kagami-kun?_ –

The bluehead turned his face to the water, and Kagami felt like everything around him became silent again, just like yesterday.

But this silence was not at least similar. It was a brooding silence, like calm before the storm.

“Ye-yeah…” the redhead managed to blurt out despite the confusion.

– _Why is the water in this lake…_ –

The boy paused. Kagami gulped for some reason. Then, he saw something moving from the bottom of the lake.

– _…very murky today?_ –

_Huh?_

Kagami looked at the lake closely.

It was indeed dark, black.

Black, starting from the center, as if a ripple, spreading through the corners.

He was so puzzled at the event that he forgot to blink. He looked at Kuroko, and he was also affected by the dark pigment spreading in the water. From his feet, and even above his clothes, slowly it creeped into the blue head’s body. Despite that, however, Kuroko just kept looking in the water as if nothing was happening.

Panic arose from Kagami’s stomach – he wanted to get the boy out of that already pitch black boulder – but his legs refused to move.

_What…_

And when he did blink his eyes, everything was back to normal.

To normal…the lake was of shining crystal clear again.

But Kuroko Tetsuya was nowhere to be found.

“Kagami! What’re you doing there?!” Furihata, accompanied by other two batchmates, Fukuda and Kawahara, shouted at him from the pathway. “Let’s eat lunch together!”

“Yeah!” he shouted at them, and joined the group.

_What the hell just happened?_

* * *

 

“Did you know the stories about that lake?” Fukuda started as he took a bite of his tamagoyaki. “The History major girl I was talking to told me that that lake has been like that ever since this campus was established.”

“So what’s the deal? Ghost story?” Kawahara said. The other two, Furihata and Kagami listened to the conversation.

“No, not exactly, but think about it, man! We just celebrated the Centennial when we’re freshmen! It’s been like that, untouched and unpolluted for about 100 years!”

“I don’t believe you.” Furihata interjected, while Kagami nodded. “Did you not consider that maybe it’s just maintained?”

“No, I had asked every staff from buildings around the lake, and they don’t give a damn on the lake. And also, look! They had this picture.” Fukuda fished out the vintage picture from his bag, and put down the table. “That girl was actually writing her thesis about the legends and mysteries surrounding this lake. I’ve always wondered also, so she even shared a lot of stories about it! I don’t know whether it’s true though, but it’s quite interesting.”

“This is pretty old.” Kagami commented as he observed the paper inside the lamination. It looked like it would crumble, if not for the plastic protection . “Maybe this is just an edited photo?”

“No, you see there’s no bridge right there.” Fukuda pointed on the left corner portion of the image. “Usually, when you take a picture of it, that bridge always comes with it. And also, there were more rocks in this portion. Looking at the grass, you know that these are carabao grass, which exactly something you don’t see in this campus.”

“You know you’re stuff man!” Kawahara said. “Tell us more! Just the most famous legend, or maybe ghost story!”

“No…no… ghost story, p-please.” The redhead pleaded, but his three friends pretended not to hear anything.

“The most credible legend she told me happened just a decade ago. That there was a boy who fed himself to the mythical fish that resides in this lake.”

“HUH?! Where in that story is credible, Fukuda?” Kawahara asked, annoyed.

“But! Just listen first! So this mythical fish, they call “Kurokai”, which was interpreted as “Black Dragon” or “Black Church”, depending on how they write it, was really just some legend. But apparently this boy, a major in Japanese literature, believed in the existence of this fish.”

“A boy major in Japanese lit. Wow.” Furihata stated. “So, why did he feed himself to the fish?”

“I’ll be on it for a while. It was proven that this boy belonged to the organization in their major, called the Generation of Miracles, who denied his theory. So, apparently, to prove that Kurokai really exist, he jumped into the lake.”

“Wait! He jumped, you say? Is he that desperate? Also, no matter how you look at it, the water looks very shallow!” Kawahara almost shouted. But since the cafeteria was noisy in general, no one minded. “You can see the bottom even from afar. I bet that boy died because he hit his head in the rock or something.”

“Well, there was no proof that the boy died. It was proven in the statement from the leader of the organization, Akashi Seijuuro that the boy really jumped into the water. Everyone from the Generation of Miracles also witnessed it. They cannot stop him from doing the “foolishness”, as they had worded.”

“That’s fucked man. So they did not even try capturing him, or something?”

“Well, I think they believed that the boy will only suffer injuries. So, to satisfy him, they let him jump to the lake. And then apparently, the whole body sank into the water. And when the boy was not surfacing, they all looked at the water and it was as clear as it was before.”

“REALLY? Hey, is that even a true story?!” Kagami almost shouted as he felt goosebumps in his body.

“So what’s the name of the boy? You mentioned the leader’s name, but not the boy who jumped?” Furihata asked.

“Well, according to the Generation of Miracles, they had apparently forget his name. His records were also erased. Kise Ryouta, one of them who can draw, said that he cannot put into the paper the face of the boy he visualizes in his head.”

“The more I hear the story, the more I don’t believe it, Fukuda.” Kawahara said.

“Yeah, it seemed like some ghost story you see in manga or drama.” Furihata also said.

“Ok, ok, whatever. They say that all they can remember is the boy’s blue hair.”

 “Blue hair…” Kagami recalled the events before, and the boy sitting in the boulder.

– _Hello, good afternoon_ –

The deadpan expression, the distant voice, and how the sounds just became cancelled when that boy started talking...

– _Are you also going to feed the fishes?_ –

And the spreading black pigment-like object arising from the bottom of the lake, as if a dream...

– _Why is the water in this lake…very murky today?_ –

“Kagami? Kagami?” Furihata called out, worried about his friend spacing in one corner, uncharacteristically ignoring his food. Kagami was known for his appetite, after all.

“Ah…sorry, it’s nothing…”


	3. Denial

**_3 rd person POV_ **

_That’s not true. Not fucking true. And blue hair... it’s definitely very rare, or maybe that dude dyed his hair, but it can be any shade of blue. There’s dark blue, navy blue…light blue…_

Kagami scratched his head as he kept thinking about the story Fukuda shared a while ago. The possibility that it might concern that bluehead boy he saw in the lake scared him, but he could not bring himself to believe. However, when he recalled that scene about the dark water in the lake, he thought, maybe it was true.

No, no, no. He kept telling himself.

It had only been about half an hour since they left the cafeteria and went separate ways. Kagami had no more classes, and decided to go home. It was still early, around 3pm, but maybe he could play a little bit in the street courts.

And unfortunately, his path towards his apartment meant that he had to go across the Math building. Which also meant that he needed to pass by the lake.

He sighed. What a day.

As he stepped inside the park, he could feel that the atmosphere of the surrounding had changed. It was like everything became quiet once again. The noisy background from the adjacent buildings was reduced to silence, and even the sound of wind or the chirping of birds vanished.

His line of sight unconsciously followed the lake. And so his feet.

He came closer and closer. He was conscious. He knew he was going towards the lake. Yet, he could not fight it, nor he had the will to even struggle. As if he was hypnotized.

The bluehead was again sitting in the same boulder just like this morning. He looked at Kagami with the usual deadpan look, and greeted him with monotone voice.

By the time he heard the voice, he became aware of his location, and his condition. He was standing a meter away from the bluehead, and his shoes were slightly dirty from the muddy path.

- _You really like going in here, don’t you, Kagami-kun? –_

Kuroko was once again throwing pebbles in the lake. And the ripples were created when those pebbles touched the lake. Pebble after pebble, and every wave pattern interfered with one another.

“Well, yeah. It’s the shortest way to my apartment and to the Math building, after all.” He answered.

And then, he remembered the talk about the lake.

He wanted answers from this boy. Maybe he knew something.

“Na, Kuroko?”

_\- Yes? –_

The bluehead looked at Kagami. That was when the latter felt the shivers. The look that Kuroko was giving him had no emotions in them, his eyes looked dead.

“Do you know the term ‘Kurokai’?” he finally asked. But his heartbeat remained very fast.

That expression from Kuroko did not change.

 _\- It is a mythical fish that is said to live here._ –

“Huh?”

Now, that was not Kagami was expecting.

Wait, what did he meant about that?

“Are you a student here?” he asked. “You take classes?”

Kuroko looked disappointed, Kagami thought.

- _I am a student here. I’m a major in Japanese literature. –_

“Ah, I see… haha.”

_\- How about Kagami-kun?-_

“I’m from Sports Science.”

_\- I see, so do you play any sports? –_

“I play basketball! I like dunking!” Kagami answered enthusiastically. Somehow, he found himself talking to Kuroko, who he once suspected as a dead man, like a normal student would do.

- _What a coincidence. I also play basketball. –_

Kagami saw Kuroko smile. So that man could also smile, huh.

That was really unexpected.

“Really?! With that little body of yours?” the redhead said, and then he felt a jab in his abdomen.

“Ite…! Hey!” he hissed in pain, and saw Kuroko already standing near him, his left fist curled from the punch.

_\- I might be small, but I love basketball from the bottom of my heart –_

The bluehead looked livid, but when Kagami saw this, the more he thought that maybe Kuroko was just really a regular human. Or really just a student. Dead people should not be able to display all sorts of emotion, even with his poker face.

“Then, let’s have one-on-one! There’s a court near my apartment!” he said.

And there was a pregnant silence.

Everything was mute again.

“Kuroko?” he asked, as he felt something wrong with his surroundings. Maybe it was just his imagination, but the bluehead not replying bothered him quite a lot. Kuroko just looked on the ground, and his bangs were hiding the look from his face.

– _I’m sorry, Kagami-kun. It’s already time. Goodbye._ –

And just like their first meeting, the sound gradually returned as he watched Kuroko’s retreating back.

By the time he had exited the lake, it was already 10 pm.

Really, what had just happened?


	4. Unknown Past

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a flashback chapter, and there will be no Kuroko no Basuke characters.

Once upon a time, there was a man, named as Otoko, who had just lost his wife, Onna by falling into a ravine when they were collecting woods in the forest near the village. That night, despite being haunted by thoughts of his weakness of not being able to save his wife, he fell asleep. And he dreamt of Goddess.

The Goddess in his dream was floating above a certain lake, and she told him that it was that lake that was keeping their village prosperous.

He was not able to believe it. He had just lost his wife. The village was not prosperous in his eyes anymore.

The Megami-sama told her that he would erase his memories of his wife, so that he would not suffer.

Entranced by the Goddess’ beauty and majestic voice, he believed any word that was said. She told the man that the lake needed to be protected and maintained, and if Otoko would manage to do that, the Goddess will keep his memories without any single thing about his wife. However, if he failed to do so, he would be haunted by his wife’s death in his entire life.

Otoko accepted the deal. And then he woke up.

He had only remembered that he saw a Goddess in his dream, who commanded her to find the lake that needed to be maintained.

His body moved in its own will as it immediately went outside the house, not even eating breakfast nor changing his clothes.

He found the lake in the middle of the forest, and it was exactly what he had seen in his dream.

He prayed before the lake, believing that the Goddess were present somewhere.

The next day, he spread the word in his village. At first, the villagers thought it was just a prank from Otoko. However, he managed to get them to believe when the wilted plants watered by the lakewater became suddenly glowing and bearing flowers once again.

They built a shrine, and prayed for their Megami-sama.

For a decade, the village did not starve. Otoko did not see the Goddess in his dream again, but he was satisfied that he was the first one to be able to talk to her.

It was then that one winter day, the lakewater was increasingly becoming dark.

Since everything was covered in white sheets of snow, its murkiness was very evident, and the villagers were becoming agitated and confused by the sudden change. But they thought and hoped, that the lake would become normal the next day.

They were wrong. The next morning, all the crops they had saved for winter suddenly became wilted, inedible. Their sources of water became dirty as well, and many villagers started to become sick.

The villagers all crashed in front of the shrine, in front of the lake, and prayed all day.

It did not work.

Driven by hunger and desperation, the remaining villagers that were still strong enough came crashing to Otoko, asking his guidance for the matter. He himself did not know what had suddenly happened, so he told the villagers that he would try to talk to Megami-sama.

That night, he had sleepwalked to the lake, and in his unconscious mind came the image of a Goddess with a dirtied clothes and sullen expression.

“Megami-sama, what has became of …!” he said, but was startled when the lake became darker than before.

“The lake needed to be maintained. There should be a sacrifice. Should you not bring anything that would satisfy me within tomorrow, I cannot guarantee this villager’s safety.”

“Can I ask what exactly a sacrifice is?” he asked, but by that time, he woke up in front of the lake, and it was the real world once again.

Troubled, he confided with his wife’s sister (He did not know it was his wife’s sister, but just a close friend). The wife’s sister, named Neesan, told him maybe a big animal would be enough for a sacrifice.

Then, he asked Neesan’s husband and a former hunter, Danna, to tell him which was the biggest animal that could be hunted in the forest. He was told it was the Kuma, a brown-furred bear. Danna warned him that it was quite an aggressive animal, but Otoko just begged him to lend him a bow and arrow to kill the Kuma to present it to the Megami-sama. Danna had no choice, for it was for the sake of the village.

Otoko shot the Kuma, right in the head, instantly killed. He carried the bear by sliding it on the ground, towards the lake, and said, “Megami-sama, this is the village’s sacrifice.”

He also chanted some prayers, and performed the ritual of sacrifice, and happily announced to the village’s head, that he had fulfilled the Goddess’ wish. The village head spread the word within the night, and many people rejoiced with the thought that they would be able to eat their crops once again.

* * *

 

Neesan woke up the next day, chilled by the winter cold, and discovered that the crops they kept in the chest that was just inedible the other day became suddenly ripe-looking. She immediately nagged her husband to also rise, and see that they could really eat good food once again.

After breakfast, when Neesan talked to other villagers, she discovered that the same event happen to every one of them.

“Where’s Otoko?” Danna asked his wife when they were eating dinner. “Usually, he’d come here asking for your food, right?”

“I have no idea. That man does not know how to cook!” she exclaimed. “Maybe he just ate the vegetables raw due to hunger?”

“Calm down, Nee. Go to his house, and you can bring his portion. My best friend better not go starving himself.”

“I’ll do, I’ll do. Thank you.”

* * *

 

She went to his house, and it showed no signs of anyone inside. She decided not to think anything bad, but she did not see Otoko inside the house. She knew that his sister’s husband never went out during the night and that was why she found this event puzzling.

“Otoko-kun?” she yelled, but her voice only echoed. “Otoko-kun! I’ve brought your food!”

She placed the bowl of food in the table, and searched around the house while shouting the name.

He only found a diary in a chair beside the bed.

“04/01/XX94 – My ~~wife~~ was mourning for the sudden loss of his brother, who died after being bitten by a snake. I tried cheering her up, but it failed.

.

.

.

04/01/XX04 – My ~~wife~~ died.

04/02/XX04 – A Goddess in my dream told me about a lake. We made an important deal, but I forgot the conditions. Either way, she asked me to protect and maintain the lake.

04/03/XX04 – I found the lake. It was very clear and beautiful lake in the middle of the forest. I told Danna about this, and he told me that for his entire hunting life, he never knew of this lake.

04/04/XX04 – I told the villagers of the Goddess. They did not believe me, because most of the crops were dying in the summer heat, so there’s no way that a mere lake would save the village.

04/05/XX04 – With the help of Danna, we watered all the crops before sunrise

04/06/XX04 – With some convincing, the villagers finally believed about the lake when the rice fields became alive once again. Danna backed me up, so it worked very well.

04/07/XX04 – Neesan proposed we have a celebration, and we did

.

.

.

05/01/XX04 – The village head told me that a shrine is suitable for a Goddess, so we started building it.

.

.

.

06/01/XX04 – The shrine was finished. We established a weekly village-wide prayer for the Goddess.

.

.

04/04/XX10 – I’m starting to see weird dreams. A voice of Goddess in pain.

.

.

.

03/29/XX14 – The lake was very dark. And all the food in the house became unusable.

03/30/XX14 – The villagers went to my house and asked me to do something.

03/31/XX14 – I dreamt of Goddess asking for sacrifice. Danna lend me his bow and arrow to kill the Kuma, the largest wild animal, to make it the sacrifice.”

* * *

 

Neesan had scanned the whole village, house by house, about the whereabouts of Otoko, but she found nothing. She went into the forest, and to the lake, only to find it pristine once again. He found no signs of his sister’s husband.

When it was really late at night, she decided to come home, thinking that maybe his husband would really be worried.

She found out that her husband also tried searching for Otoko, and also resulted to nothing. They decided to sleep, and continue the search tomorrow.

Neesan then woke up with the continuous murmurs from beside her, and realized that Danna was sleeptalking.

“God…lake…protect…He…” his husband mumbled with pained expression. Then, there were tears in his eyes. “He…died…no…suffer…maintain…lake…”

“Danna! Danna!” Neesan shook his husband’s body, but this did not manage to wake him up. After a while, she realize that the sleep-talking has ceased.

Neesan fell asleep again.

* * *

 

“Where are you going, Danna?” she stepped before the door as he asked his husband who were uncharacteristically eager to go out that morning.

“I’m going to the lake! A God in my dreams told me to maintain the lake’s cleanliness!”

“Why are you talking like Otoko-kun? Aren’t we going to search for him?!”

“Who’s Otoko?” he asked. And Neesan could only look puzzled.

“What?”

“You mentioned ‘Otoko’. Who’s that and why are we going to search for that person?”

“What…”

“Listen, Nee. I’m going to the lake, just for a while! Then, I’ll come back right away and listen what you have to tell me.” Danna was easily able to get pass through his wife, and dashed to the lake while humming.

* * *

 

Indeed, for the next 10 years, the village was not starved.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As you can see, the names of the characters correspond to their role in this backstory. Otoko = man, Onna = woman, Danna = husband, Neesan = Sister, Megami-sama = Goddess.


End file.
